Sascoc settles with Graeme Joffe… for R1.3 million

Ouch.

Sports journalist Graeme Joffe has been slapped with a bull of R1.3 million to be paid to SASCOC after a long-standing legal case was settled on Tuesday, Sascoc said in a statement.

Sascoc said:

The settlement offer is a clear indication that, despite Joffe’s numerous allegations and challenges to SASCOC, he was unable to substantiate or provide evidence that would have stood up in court. Hence the offer to settle is an acceptance of his misconduct.

Sasoc filed a defamation claim against Joffe in 2013 following a series of articles and Tweets which the sporting body deemed to be “unjustified and defamatory”.

The case dragged on and on and Joffe fled South Africa, saying his life was being threatened. In 2015, Joffe raised over 100 technical objections to Sascoc’s claim. All of them were dismissed, according to Sascoc.

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Sasoc further claims that when passing judgment at that time, High Court Judge, J Francis said that he found it “rather disturbing that the defendant having admitted that the particulars of claim have all been pleaded following the usual precedents for pleading defamation actions, still persisted with the exceptions.”

Judge Francis added that “this is clear a waste of court time and resources. The exceptions raised by the defendant are the worst form of nit picking that I have come across in my thirteen years on the bench.”

Sascoc says that it withdrew action against Joffe on 6 July 2017, after terms were reached.